How I’m using my vacation days to maximize my happiness

One of the biggest perks for federal employment is a generous amount of annual leave. I currently earn 8 hours of vacation for every 80 hours I work. I’ve also maxed out the amount of vacation I can carry over from year to year. Therefore, each year I “need” to take 208 vacation. One would think that I’d be in an enviable position. However, I’ve rarely used my vacation days in a way that made me truly happy. This year my plan is to use my vacation days to maximize my happiness. Here’s how I’m doing it.

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What’s wrong with me?

You’re probably asking yourself, “how could this guy have so much vacation but not be happy with his vacation?” I was wondering the same thing myself. Despite having more vacation than anyone I knew, I’ve always approached my vacation with a “scarcity mindset”. In other words, I’ve always been afraid that I’d “run out” of vacation before the end of the year. (By “run out” I mean, meet the maximum carry-over amount. I view this bank of 240 hours as part of my emergency fund. That way, if I am ever terminated, I leave with 6 weeks of salary in my pocket)

Just typing this previous paragraph was absurd. How could someone have 26 vacation days (+ 10 paid holidays) and worry about running out. My biggest fear has always been childcare.

The link between vacation and childcare

For the past 11 years, my time off has been intricately linked to childcare. When my first daughter was born, we had the flexibility to send her to daycare less. So each day I took off, I could “save” $60 if I watched her instead of sending her to daycare. (Man, inflation is such a bitch. What I wouldn’t give to have $60/day childcare in 2019…).

Whether or not it was true, I felt like there was a $60 “daycare tax” to take a vacation day. I stopped using vacation days for fun. Pretty soon, I ended up in this situation where I would need to burn vacation days before the end of the year. And it became a tradition of scheduling a few vacation days per pay period at the end of the year to reduce childcare costs.  

I love my daughters. A lot. But spending a day trapped in the house with them in the middle of a Midwest winter isn’t relaxing. At all. It’s a miserable way to spend vacation days.

Eventually, I changed things up and tried to take more vacation days in the middle of summer rather than the middle of winter. (I.e. spending each Friday in August with my daughter or daughters). This was slightly better, but (1) it still didn’t allow me to recharge during my time off and (2) I still ended up with “use or lose” at the end of the year.

School made things even more complicated

Once my oldest started school, there was a whole new set of issues to navigate. The school calendar was filled with random days off. Typically 1 per month while school was in session and then 2 full weeks in winter plus 1 full week in spring. All told, that created about 25 days of childcare that we needed to cover plus summer vacation. (GOOD LUCK finding a reliable summer camp that covers every single day from school to school).

My wife and I have done a great job of working out who is watching the kids on all of the random days off and Christmas vacation. It’s truly a team effort. Unfortunately, childcare & gap care has consumed nearly all of my wife’s vacation time for the past 11 years. The biggest gap in childcare to fill always comes around Christmas. Therefore, I’ve always hoarded vacation until this gets settled (typically around December 1st) in case that I need to cover the whole break.

I’ve never, ever, had to cover the whole break. And hoarding vacation to cover it just results in my having to schedule extra vacation days randomly throughout the month of December. I think this past December I was taking every Tuesday & Thursday off. Or something random. The worst part about not scheduling vacation is that meetings pop up and prevent you from taking a long stretch.

(I just want to mention that I’m extremely thankful for my December Tuesday’s & Thursday’s off with no kids this past year. It was a luxury my wife didn’t get. And it’s a luxury very few people can enjoy. However, I want to use my vacation days to maximize my happiness, not just survive them).

How the government shutdown affected my views on vacation

I had a very pleasant time during the government shutdown. Firstly, I knew we were financially secure and was able to enjoy my time off. Furthermore, I was lucky to be furloughed and not required to work. And our financial security was a combination of our hard work and frugal lifestyle which was compounded by privilege we have experienced.

During the shutdown, I was able to completely and fully unwind from tension I’d been carrying a long time. It was during this time I read The Joy of Not Working (while sitting in front of the fire drinking an espresso, under blankets with cats). This book transformed my life (read more about that here!). The book allowed me to give leisure activities the value they deserve and I devoted the rest of the shutdown to leisure. I read books and played piano. Additionally, I met the kids after school each day and sat down with them as they had snack and talked about their school day. I took care of a few things I wanted to do “some day”. I felt super happy.

How a staycation is using my vacation days to maximize happiness

I love traveling and have backpacked through Europe multiple times including doing so with children. However, most of these trips have been when I’ve been based in Europe for work. My ideal foreign adventure doesn’t involve cramming sightseeing into a 7-10 day trip but instead involves living in a home city and slowly discovering new things over the course of months. So while I’d love to use my vacation to travel more, I think it’s something that is best suited for me to do either post-FIRE or during the next time I’m stationed abroad.

Given that foreign travel is not practical, devoting time to leisure is my next favorite way to spend a vacation day. Instead of waiting until the end of the year to plan my vacation time, this year I decided to plan it out at the beginning of the year. And what I found was magical. I learned that I had enough time off to cover the dreaded days off of school AND take some time off for myself.

I currently plan to take a week off in spring, and a week off in fall. The rest of my 208 hours will be devoted to childcare. But planning 2 entire weeks off to myself seems like an incredible luxury. I can barely contain myself typing this. I’m planning on devoting significant time to leisure.

The Spring Staycation

Inspired by The 76k Project’s career intermission updates, I thought I’d share what my current plans are:

• Have a family member change my password to lock me off Twitter for the week
• Exercise every day
• Drive to a state park to catch the best trail running in the area
• Play fun songs on the piano (maybe put them up on my dumpsterFIRE YouTube channel)
• Buy some pants that actually fit me & go through my closet like the Financial Mechanic
• Write 5 blog posts
• Read 2 books
• Install a sensor to sub-meter our hot water usage
• Freezer cook some meals

I think if I accomplish half the things on this list, I’ll have accomplished my goal of using my vacation days to maximize my happiness. I promise to write a follow-up post with what I actually did.

A final note on using vacation days to maximize happiness

I really do realize that this post is coming from a place of privilege. I’m very lucky to have the amount of vacation I do. And the financial wherewithal to not have to use my vacation days to work a second job. I get a lot more vacation than my wife, who has used every last one of her vacation days since who knows when taking care of our children.

While the vacation is an incredible gift, in the past, I’ve squandered my vacation days because I felt like it wasn’t fair to actually enjoy time off without my kids. It seems to me that as long as I have the vacation days, I should enjoy them and the worst thing I could do is burn them because I needed to instead of using them with intention and purpose.

So- what do you think? How would you use vacation days to maximize happiness?